The only problem with the financial constraints in Townsville is playing under in recent seasons is that every year they go without winning it all is another year they drift further away from the local public's consciousness. Basketball used to be huge in Townsville, even long after the national "demise" of the sport, but now the average local would struggle to name a single player on the team.
They are struggling to get people through the gates at the moment. The people who do bother to show up barely even cheer.
Spend just a little more and it might be better financially in the long term. You add a 6"11' legit starting NBL center to this roster and it's a bona fide championship contender. With Withers its a playoff contender for now, with championship hopes resting on many (waaay too many for my liking) variables.
They narrowed their search down to two guys (none of whom were Withers), and obviously couldn't get either of them to put pen to paper. The whole offseason was spent teasing fans about this near-seven-foot monster the front office was about to bring over from the States. Instead we got a guy that looks to be undersized even for the power forward position starting as your center. It pisses people off if the gamble doesn't pay off. And pissed off people don't pay money for seats.
An extra twenty or forty grand and you might have the "back to the basket post monster" that the fans were promised, a title and sellouts for the next couple of seasons. It's still a gamble, but so is the "fiscally responsible" position of not ponying up the dough at all.
Instead of being right up there from the get go with Perth & NZ, your title hopes* are resting on whether or not Ben Allen can play pro ball -- and right now everything I've ever seen says he can't.
I know which gamble I'd rather take. But hey, it's not my decision. And I'm the rare pissed off guy who will pay for seats either way.
*Obviously it all changes and I eat my words if Withers and Forte are both absolute gems -- even playing out of position. But it's still a huuuuge gamble to be making with a squad that was one win away from the finals last season.
On another note: who was the last team to win it all in the NBL with a "small ball" roster?